Celebrating 70 years: Owen Mumford reflects on its journey toward smarter, more sustainable healthcare manufacturing.

Jesper Jonsson, Director of Medical Devices, looks back on what the family-owned company has accomplished so far and discusses its vision for the years ahead.

How did Owen Mumford get started?

The company was founded in 1952 by Ivan Owen and John Mumford. Their beginnings were humble, working out of a small garage and focusing on improving existing medical products.¹ After that, they moved into designing aluminum molds for the plastic injection molding industry. With this expertise in cutting-edge molding processes, they went on to create original medical devices.² Since then, the business has grown from a small family-run operation in Woodstock near Oxford, into a global innovator in medical devices and a trusted partner to many of the world’s largest pharmaceutical and diagnostic companies, with offices in the USA, France, Germany, and Malaysia.

Over the last 70 years, Owen Mumford has introduced several world firsts, starting with the first automatic lancing device for diabetes. What impact did that breakthrough have?

Following a conversation with two professors from Oxford’s Diabetes Research Laboratory in 1977, Owen Mumford was invited to design and manufacture a groundbreaking medical device: the world’s first automatic lancing device for diabetes. Autolet® debuted in 1978, establishing the company as a leader in medical device innovation and, most importantly, significantly increasing diabetes blood monitoring worldwide.

We’re also proud to have created the first plastic auto-injector (Autoject®), which has made it easier for people of all ages to use syringe-based medication. Other milestones include the automatic insulin pen (Accupen®) and the first pen needle and remover in one (Unifine® Pentips® Plus).

The Owen Mumford diabetes line includes a safety pen needle with an active safety feature. What advantages does an active device offer, where the user has to manually activate the safety mechanism?

With the Unifine SafeControl®³ safety pen needle, the user is an active participant in the safety process, pressing a tab to retract the needle after injection. This design lets users confirm the full dose has been given before retracting the needle, offering extra confidence and control.

For maximum safety, users can both hear and see when the safety feature is engaged, and the device comes with a cover that protects the needle at both ends after use. Since the user can see the needle, they maintain full control throughout the process. Functionally, the safety pen needle works just like a conventional pen needle, making the experience as seamless and intuitive as possible.

Besides diabetes, does Owen Mumford make medical devices for other treatment areas?

Although we started with diabetes products, we also manufacture devices for other therapeutic areas. This year we launched a new range for venous blood collection. Building on our history of capillary blood sampling, this range is designed to maximize safety, comfort, and quality. Needlestick injuries are a significant concern in many healthcare environments, and our products are engineered to protect both patients and healthcare workers.

A product we’re particularly proud of is Simplitude ByMe, an at-home HIV self-test kit that delivers results in less than 15 minutes. Our recent collaborations with HIV Scotland and the Terrence Higgins Trust provided 7,000 test kits to support Scotland’s Generation Zero initiative to end HIV transmission within a generation.

We also have a second business division: Owen Mumford Pharmaceutical Services, which focuses on designing, developing, and manufacturing injectable drug delivery systems for pharmaceutical, biotech, and generics industries. These products help deliver a variety of medications around the world every day. The division’s products are backed by a team of pharmaceutical experts who work with partners throughout the product development process.

Pharmaceutical Services offers products like UniSafe®, a springless, passive safety device for pre-filled syringes, and Aidaptus®, a disposable two-step auto-injector that can adjust to different fill volumes with a single device, providing flexibility for formulation changes during development and product life cycle management.

How does Owen Mumford stand out from the competition?

We seek out top talent across every area, from design to engineering, to turn innovative ideas into commercial products with the goal of improving patient lives. We talk to both patients and healthcare professionals to truly understand how devices are used, what risks and challenges they face, and what they prefer. This insight, along with a multidisciplinary team including R&D specialists, human factors experts, and patent attorneys, allows us to create devices tailored for the end user. We constantly look to solve problems with existing products, ensuring that our offering is always evolving and improving.

Sustainability is a critical issue and priority for all industries. For makers of single-use medical devices, what is your strategy for balancing environmental responsibility with infection prevention?

Sustainable practices in medical device manufacturing require a holistic approach across processes and operations. We are committed to optimizing every step of our operations to minimize environmental impact. We’ve already joined several initiatives to help us achieve our environmental goals. The Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi)⁴ helped us outline how quickly we can cut greenhouse gas emissions. We’re confident that with these targets, we can reach net zero emissions by 2045 and cut emissions in half by 2030. To ensure progress and accountability, we underwent third-party verification to earn B Corp⁵ certification — we’re proud to be among the first medical device manufacturers worldwide to do so.

More than just setting targets, we have achieved real progress. Today, our UK facilities run on more than 99% renewable energy, including solar power we generate onsite. Across our UK, US, and Malaysian locations, we’ve cut our scope 1 and scope 2 carbon emissions⁶ by 27.3%.

What is involved in the B Corp assessment, and why did you pursue this path?

After establishing our United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), aiming for B Corp certification was a natural next step in our sustainability journey. However, B Corp is about more than environmental impact; it also covers responsible business management. The assessment thoroughly reviews areas such as environmental, social, and governance (ESG) to gauge whether a company’s practices are ready for a future where business values go beyond profit.

An outside opinion on our progress gives credibility to our sustainability messages. We especially valued B Corp because it’s not a fixed standard — instead, it guides ongoing progress against critical ESG metrics, raising expectations each year. Every year, we release our Responsible Action Report⁷ on the Owen Mumford website to share our progress on every goal. It’s important for companies to be open about their actions here so we can learn from one another — we hope this encourages more collaboration throughout the industry.

The 2022 Responsible Action Report includes details on how Owen Mumford supports women in engineering roles. Can you share more about this work?

One of our selected SDGs is focused on improving gender equality within Owen Mumford. Among the efforts supporting this is our leadership and management pathway training program. The program addresses unconscious bias and ensures consistent associate training, delivered by third-party experts.

With women making up less than a third of the STEM workforce,⁸ we want to help close this gap. By collaborating with local schools and colleges and sponsoring early career, apprenticeship, and internship programs, we are working to make an impact. Since 2017, we have also monitored and addressed gender pay differences across our sites.

What’s coming up next for Owen Mumford?

These are exciting times for us! We’re building a brand new, state-of-the-art manufacturing facility in Witney, Oxfordshire. The £14 million site is being developed with sustainability at its core to achieve BREEAM⁹ certification, which gauges economic sustainability performance. This facility will set a new standard for world-class medical device design and development, creating a hub for automation and assembly excellence.

We also welcomed a new research and development director this year.¹⁰ Bal Johal brings a wealth of experience from the medical device and pharmaceutical fields, with past roles at Circassia, GlaxoSmithKline, Pfizer, and Mundipharma Research Ltd. Her expertise will be key as we work to create new products that improve experiences for healthcare professionals and patients alike.